The American Heiress
by Sera dy Relandrant
Summary: 1888. Martha Levinson wants a title for her daughter and Robert Crawley desperately needs a fortune to restore Downton to its former splendor. A brilliant marriage, as the society papers call it... but will Cora Levinson and her viscount ever find love?
1. Chapter 1

**Summary: 1888. Martha Levinson wants a title for her daughter and Robert Crawley desperately needs a fortune to restore Downton to its former splendor. A brilliant marriage, as the society papers call it... but will Cora Levinson and her viscount ever find love?**

* * *

_London, July 1888_

The French windows to the terrace had been thrown open and light poured into the ladies' morning room. Cora Levison leaned against the frame for a moment and held out her hands childishly, cupping the light like powdered gold within her palms.

"Whatever are you doing, Cora?"

It was at precisely that moment that her mother had chosen to make an entrance. Martha Levinson did not so much enter a room as thrust herself in, even in the most secluded apartment she adopted the air of one pushing her way through a crowd. Cora attributed it to the hardy peasant stock that had gone into the making of her. Martha Levinson would have liked to pretend to be of respectable Patroon stock, of Dutch extraction like New York's aristocrats to whose drawing rooms she so seldom extended an invitation. She would have liked to pretend to anything but her common Jewish ancestry - and indeed, provided the proper tools, she had the aplomb and daring to pretend to anything.

Cora was to be her tool.

"Nothing mamma," Cora said resignedly, stepping back from the window.

Martha eyed her suspiciously and then sniffing, took a seat at the escritoire. "You might have gotten started on the letters, dear," she said, her tone mildly aggrieved as always. "There are ever so many thank-you notes to be written, really everyone has been so kind to us. And it always looks better if a lady of the house answers personally."

_She must have gotten it from one of her penny-magazines, _Cora thought with a twinge of irritation as she took her seat next to her mother. _How silly and pretentious - as though anyone will care to match the handwriting on my notes. We might as well have gotten a secretary - no all she wants is a spare hour everyday to lecture me. _

It began before she had even picked up the first monogrammed sheet of pale pink notepaper. "You might have gotten your maid to curl your fringe instead of braiding it under that band," she observed critically. "It looks _so_ old-fashioned."

"But it suits me, mother," Cora said in a low voice. She always spoke in a low voice to her mother, for fear that if she raised it even in the slightest she would lose her temper and begin to shout and scream. "I thought you would rather have me look my best than ape a fashion that would make me look a fool?"

Her mother had no answer to that, but she was quick to pick on another aspect of her daughter's that did not suit her exacting standards - few things did, really. "I thought you rather _too _friendly to Mr Bardsley at Lady Roscoe's soiree last night. Remember that he does not have a title to his name."

"We were only speaking of his travels, mamma. He had the most fascinating stories to tell - do you know that he has been to Morocco and Singapore?"

"A vagabond," her mother sniffed. "And a fortune-hunter I suppose."

"He is independently wealthy, I believe. And he is to inherit the Thwaite fortunes from his mother."

"But not as wealthy as you," her mother reminded her, significantly.

"I haven't a penny to my name really," Cora reminded her lightly. "I only come into my fortunes when I am twenty-five or when I marry, whichever comes first - and that marriage subject to your approval, mamma."

"And that is as it should be," her mother said smugly. "Your poor, dear papa knew what he was doing when he settled his fortunes on you two children."

_No he didn't, _she thought resentfully. Punctiliously she signed her name at the end of a gushing thank-you note to Lady Roscoe all the while seething at the unfairness of the world. _Harold receives his inheritance unconditionally when he turns twenty-one but I must wait five years more. I've only just turned twenty and mamma will be sure to marry me off, one way or another, within the year. Probably to some titled boor who will shut me up in a castle in the woods like Bluebeard while he gets his grubby hands on my money._

The parlor-maid entered, just as her mother was plumping herself up to launch another diatribe. "Lady Fenn to see you, ma'am," she said, dipping a perfunctory curtsey.

"Alix!" Martha said with pleasure, "Do send her in. I wonder what brings her here so early?" she asked of her daughter.

"An empty purse, no doubt," Cora said, but under her breath.

Alix Harlow, Lady Fenn, was a distant - _very _distant - cousin of theirs and she had been, in Martha's words, "terribly kind" in agreeing to sponsor them through their first London season. She had been married off by a calculating mamma when still a child of sixteen to a dingy baronet, she had borne him the requisite heir and spare and gone through her inheritance with as much aplomb and childlike confidence that there would always be more as him. That confidence had been misplaced and now a charming but impoverished widow, still young (she was only in her early thirties) she traded off on her social connections and personal advantages to secure her position.

She drifted into the morning room like a vaguely disoriented sprite and kissed Martha's cheek dutifully. She was a very lovely little woman, Cora had to admit, all translucent skin and soulful eyes and masses of golden-bronze hair like an autumnal beauty in a Waterhouse painting. She had the air of some ethereal being who had wandered off from a higher plane, a damsel in need of succor, still girlish and glamorous in spite of her two half-grown sons. Young men worshiped her, to them she was all fire and air and poetry. In reality, her mind was as prosaic as an... accountant's, Cora supposed. She had not any sort of contact with that strange breed of "professional men" but instinctively she associated them with all things dull and dreadful.

Today she was looking very fresh and charming in a day-dress of cream silk, patterned with rosy blossoms. There was a vaguely Oriental air to her whole costume and once again Cora was torn between admiration and jealousy.

"You look exquisite," Martha gushed warmly. "Like a..." here her too-literal mind grasped for a metaphor and the best she could come up with was, "...a flower. So charming. Cora you must have a day-dress made along the same pattern."

"The colors might not suit me, mamma," Cora said, just to be perverse.

"Nonsense!" her mother said sharply.

"Most colors would suit you," Alix said, with the easy grace of the professional socialite. "You are so young and fresh and blooming, Cora. Ah, what I would give to be twenty again!" She smiled warmly, reminiscing. "That was my summer of triumph, you see. I had just recovered from giving birth to Harry - a son and heir for the baronetcy and me hardly out of my teens. My mother and Harlow could not get enough of spoiling me, showing me and the baby off..." She trailed off and laughed apologetically.

"You will think me a dowager in my dotage now. Never mind me - I have really the loveliest news and I could not keep it to myself, I simply had to rush over to tell you."

"Yes, we wondered at your calling so early," Cora said, suppressing the sarcasm under a layer of sugary-sweetness. Alix took as much notice of her as she would a forward child and Martha did not notice the sarcasm.

"The Russells have invited me to stay at Haxby Park and they will be sure to invite you too," she said exultantly. "I was waiting for this opportunity, you have no idea of the invitations I declined for your sake." She smiled delightedly at them while Martha stared back uncomprehendingly.

"Oh my dears," Alix said, explaining patiently, "The Russells are neighbors to the Crawleys of Downton Abbey. Robert Crawley was the man I had in mind for Cora ever since I saw you both."

"Has he a-" Martha began practically.

"He is Viscount Downton now," Alix said, smiling. "And he is to be the Earl of Grantham on his father's death. He is really quite young and handsome, if I do say so myself, and the estate is not in the best of fortunes. He will be looking to marry well and really Cora could not do much better. They have held Grantham since the time of King George the Second and the estate is very charming."

It all sounded rather like a fairy-story to Cora. American wealth and British nobility. Certainly it appealed vastly to her mother's imagination - Martha's smile was as bright as an electric bulb.

"Lady Anne Russell is really a romantic at heart," Alix confided. "She's a good friend of mine and she loves nothing more than matchmaking. You will see how lovely an English summer can be in the countryside, Cora, you will love it."

"I am sure I must come to, in time," Cora said quietly, toying with her gloves. _But I don't want a lovely English summer in the lovely English countryside, _she thought wretchedly. _I want to go home. _

* * *

Cora toyed with a bouquet of roses, admiring the effect of the satiny dark leaves against the waxy-white petals and the rainbows fracturing on the cut-glass vase. She felt rather like the eye of the storm, sitting quietly on the window-seat while the maids bustled hither and to packing her things. This was what her mother had been waiting for - an invitation to an English country-house - and now, with characteristic energy, she threw herself into the proceedings - scolding, snapping, hustling and bustling like a woman possessed.

Summer was _not_ the London Season. Martha Levinson had intended all along to choose a suitable establishment to see her daughter married into - and where better to choose than in the country-side where she might see her future son-in-law in his natural habitat? A quick engagement and then a lengthy Season as a popular and settled fiancee in the winter. A spring wedding perhaps, then a summer tour in the States to show off her daughter, _Lady _Cora now, don't you know..._  
_

Cora did not realize that she was methodically tearing the roses until one of the maids gave her a startled look and glancing down, she saw her skirt littered with sad white petals. She rose quickly and brushed them off, not wanting her mother to see.

She drifted, without a purpose, through the elegant townhouse in one of London's most fashionable streets. Here she picked up a yellow-backed book and turning the gilt-tipped pages listlessly read a line of French poetry. _How pretentious, _she thought. _Mamma can_ _hardly read the language and it exhausts me to contemplate the thought of doing the same. _She trailed her fingers over the ivory keys of the piano, propitiating a jarring disharmony of sound.

"What a nice tableau you make, darling," her mother trilled, pausing as she steamrolled through the house on another interminable errand. "Englishmen are so fond of tableaux - if they could, they would cut off their women's tongues and have some clever new talking-machine installed in place. It wouldn't need to say much - just how d'you fancy the weather and how would you like your tea? Yes, I can see the men quite adoring that..."

Cora felt like cutting off her tongue at that moment. The blood rushed to her head and she felt quite savage - like a Mongol horde of one, she thought. She would have liked to cut or chop or mangle anything that came into her hands which itched, yes they really itched to kill something...

She held them up, half-expecting blood spatters like Lady Macbeth's for her rage had been such that she had forgotten herself for the moment in a red haze... they were still smoothly buttoned into her day-gloves, two sizes too small for her to make her hands seem tinier. Suddenly the madness was gone and wearily, she sagged into a sofa.

* * *

_Downton_

Robert stood in the green sitting room, acutely aware that this was to be his last time inside. The furniture and paintings inside had all been auctioned off and would be carted off tomorrow - privately and discreetly (thank God for small mercies). Downton desperately needed the money. Tomorrow the room would be boarded up.

What made the room ideal was its situation. It was not one of the fashionable rooms downstairs, whose eradication would have been noticed (and remarked upon) by visitors. It was located upstairs, just next to one of the unused boudoirs.

It had originally been given to Countess Angelica - an Italian beauty of the last century - as a private parlor to entertain her women-friends. Being an heiress of considerable means, she had furnished the room to suit her fanciful (and extravagant) tastes. It had been done up at a time when the Oriental was all the rage - the wallpaper abounded in parrots and jungle foliage. It was upholstered all in forest-green velvet with heavy gilt baroque furniture that had been the fashion a few generations ago.

There were some really exquisite paintings on the walls that had fetched a tidy sum. Vivid oils of turbaned dark men and colorful bazaar and palace scenes from India, sketches in silver-and-walnut frames of panthers and rhinoceroses and other picturesque beasts, a portrait of the Countess herself with her sultry black eyes and olive skin dressed in emeralds and green brocade.

"She was a good-looking woman," a quiet voice said. "That is, for a foreigner. I never approved of that 'vivid coloring' as they like to call it, myself. Seems like an excuse for not using enough powder." His mother sniffed and arranged herself onto one of the dark-green suede sofas so she could look all around the room. "What we need is an heiress like her again."

"Aren't you sad, mother?"

"Not as sad as you, apparently, if you have to ask me that," she said, "I've never been sentimental." She tapped the Aubusson carpet on the floor and said practically, "Better that its one of the upstairs rooms that's seldom used and hardly seen. It could have been worse. We could have ended up like the Causeys - fancy being Countess of Grantham in a cottage."

"It will never come to that," Robert said shortly.

His mother gave him a very sharp look. "I should hope not," she said.

"How is Father taking it?"

"Oh, cheerfully. He's drunk enough to keep a warship afloat at the club. And they call us the tender sex."

Robert sighed. This was how they had come to such a pass in the first place - Father could not curb his extravagances and since now, Mother, deciding that if he could not she would not, had made no effort to do so. Father kept a separate 'establishment' in London, he was incurably fond of drinking and race-horses and gambling. Mother had her house-parties, her fashionable charities and a thousand little imported luxuries that all added up - she claimed that it would be unseemly not to keep up appearances and Robert supposed that it would. But none of it came cheap all the same. And then there had been little money from the beginning as it were - Mother had not brought anything to the marriage and Father's inheritance was not as much as would be expected of an Earl of Grantham.

"We shall have to get Rosamund married quickly," his mother said. "Before the bloom is quite off the rose."

"She's only twenty-two, Mother," he reminded her.

"A pretty girl without a dowry, there are hundreds like her on the market. She has her name to recommend her and I know just the kind of buyer who might be up on the market for that sort of thing."

"She seems fond of Lord Hepworth."

"I can imagine only a few calamities worse than that," his mother said, with a theatrical shudder. "I shall have a house-party - I think I'll invite that Painswick man, a nice sort, he seems..."

"He's as rich as Croesus," Robert said bluntly, "That's all he has to recommend himself."

"Yes, I did say that he was nice, didn't I?" His mother smiled pleasantly up at him. "Do speak to Rosamund for me, will you? Remind her of her duties, as it were."

"She won't like that," Robert said bluntly.

"She won't but she's not a sentimental sort like you, darling," his mother said. "When push comes to shove, she _slams_."

He found his younger sister walking in the park. She looked most fetching with her golden ringlets twisted up into a chignon, in her gown of sea-green lace with the matching parasol poised daintily over her face. With her pure ivory outlines and grave blue eyes she had an air of sweetness and spirituality, like a Filippo Lippi Madonna - quite at odds with her true character which as hard and unyielding as bedrock.

He walked with her and slowly told her what their mother had said.

Her eyes became glassy as he spoke, she slowed down and presently sat down in one of the benches, not speaking.

"She won't force you," Robert told her, taking her hand and sitting down next to her.

"But I will force myself," Rosamund said.

"If you love someone else-"

"I don't really," Rosamund said frankly. "I love luxury and I hate to see things dingy, that's all."

"We are hardly dingy at Downton," he said, offended. "Things haven't come to such a pass-"

"But they might," she reminded him coolly, looking down at her polished nails. "Where _is _the money to come from, Robert? Don't tell me about your dear, demented schemes - they are all doomed to failure. I'm not as stupid as I have to show the men." She pursed her lips. "Marmaduke Painswick," she said slowly, "I know hardly anything of him. How is he?"

"Dull. A boor really," Robert said promptly. "Not your type at all."

"I could live with that," she said consideringly. "As long as he let me please myself. I think it would be rather fun to marry, come to think of it, I wouldn't be under Mamma's thumb, I could hold my own parties and order my own house as it suited me." She laughed at the horrified look on Robert's face. "Oh dear Robert," she said, stroking his cheek, "you can be such a foolish darling sometimes and we all love you for it. But a girl has to be sensible. I've had a lovely three Seasons at London, no girl could ask for better, and its high time I bound myself to the yoke. Silken or steel, its my choice."

"It seems so unfair for a woman," Robert said, moved by his sister's cheerful indifference. It did not seem quite right that a woman, of whom one would expect more tender and delicate sensibilities, should be so hard-headed. Marry for money? Rosamund took that into her stride more easily than he ever could.

"If you knew what was best for Downton you would do as I did," Rosamund said cheekily, "Marry some bright American heiress - there are boatloads of them running around the Continent hunting for titles, I believe."

"Rosamund!" he said, quite shocked.

"There I've offended you again - just as I wanted to. You mustn't keep on falling for my tricks, Robert," she said, giggling. "I'd best brush up on my knowledge of Painswick if I am to pursue him with any success," she added and rising, drifted languidly in the direction of the house. But her words gave Robert pause for thought. Marry an American heiress, some wild, headstrong chit with flyaway hair and hands more suited to milking cows as he supposed all American girls who had not been suitably trained were? Impossible! The very idea was repugnant to him.

But... if that was the only way that he could save Downton?


	2. Chapter 2

_Haxby Park_

Cora Levinson awoke, as she had done every morning of her life, to a sumptuously-appointed apartment. The setting was always the same - whether in their Cincinnati mansion, the New York brownstone, the London townhouse, the family yacht or a fashionable villa on the Riviera. Why should it be any different in an English country estate?

Even the sunlight seemed to glimmer more richly as though her hostess, in the confidence of her wealth, thought nothing of replacing the natural light (which after all did not cost a thing) with powdered gold to welcome her guests every morning. It brought out the cherry depths of the elegant mahogany furniture. Lady Anne Russell was a young bride without a mother-in-law and had dispensed with the baroque monstrosities of a former generation - she liked everything to look modern and so it did.

There was a freckled little English maid bustling about doing the things that maids generally did - straightening the carpets, tying the curtain-sashes, arranging the fresh flowers in the vases and generally setting everything to rights' so that m'lady would not wake up to the disagreeableness of an untidy room. Cora watched her languidly throw half-closed eyes, snapping in and out of the dozy pleasantness. Presently the girl left and her own maid, Rosa, came in.

"Miss Cora, begging your pardon, but your mother would like to see as soon as you're ready."

Cora yawned and stretched, reluctantly pushing herself off the pillows. "How did you know I was up, Rosa?"

"I haven't maided for you for three years for nothing, miss," Rosa said wryly and then added, "And I've maided enough for young ladies to know that they'd always rather be in bed when there's work to be done."

"Mercy, Rosa, I'm not here to work. I'm here to play and enjoy myself."

Rosa threw her a shrewd look. "If you say so, miss," she said and drifted to the wardrobe.

"Won't you ask me what I'd look to wear?" Cora asked, slipping her feet into her bedroom slippers.

"No, miss. I have my orders from your mother already about what you're to wear - the lilac with the silver braid and jet buttons."

Cora laughed but she was irritated. "Does she think I'm likely to create a scandal with my clothes?" she asked crossly.

"Begging your pardon, miss, but I don't think she'd like to take any chances." Rosa emerged with the day-dress and added, "She told me she was worried you'd spoil your chances by being headstrong."

"Not my chances, _hers_," Cora muttered. "Oh I can't wait till I'm married and then I'll show her-"

"Yes, miss, but you're not yet," Rosa reminded her placidly.

_To be or not to be, _Cora thought, allowing herself to be dressed like a doll. She did not want to be married off yet but to be an unmarried girl, to do as she was bidden as though she had as much sense as a sheep, was intolerable. _There are worse mammas, _she thought, trying to placate herself. _Sara Brympton's mamma used to lace her into a spine-straightener for two hours everyday to improve her carriage. Kitty Gillis' mamma watched over everything she ate and used to half-starve the poor girl. _

Cora submitted to the ministrations of the toilette meekly but balked when Rosa tried to dress her hair in the fashionable Josephine curls. "She won't mind if I have my hair done to suit myself," she pleaded, "its such a little thing, Rosa."

"Miss-"

Cora sighed and moved swiftly to find her purse. "Here's twenty dollars," she said, putting the money in Rosa's palm. "Now listen to me for once, for goodness' sake. You're my maid, not my chaperone - you're paid to serve me, not to order me about."

Rosa pocketed the money in her apron with a guileless look. "Very good, miss," she said demurely and then proceeded to do Cora's hair in a low Hebe knot at the base of her neck. Cora had the errant curls smoothed off her forehead under a narrow band of seed pearls. She smiled a little shyly at herself in the looking glass.

"I don't look bad at all, do I, Rosa?" she asked her maid.

She knew she was considered something of a beauty in the circles she moved in - "pretty but rather common, like a daisy in the fields" had been the astringent view of several high-society matrons but all the boys liked her well enough. _Town Topics _called her "the willowy and graceful Miss Levinson". Her figure, slim and shapely, was exquisite - everyone agreed on that after she had appeared as Minerva in a Roman tableau in form-flattering white robes. Her hair was so dark as to be almost black and in delightful contrast, her skin was porcelain_. _If her face was not classically beautiful, then it was said to be very sweet, almost elfin with her black doe-eyes, pert nose and shy smile.

In short, she was as pretty and therefore useful a daughter as her mother could have wished for. "Your looks are wasted here," Mamma would always tell her, laughing, when she was a little girl, "I'll make a princess out of you." Cora had no doubt that if her mother was not successful in capturing an English lord for her, she would be taken next Season to the Continent to try her luck on the innumerable Frenchdukes and Italian princes.

Cora had liked the idea of being a princess well enough when she was a child but now she was not so sure.

"You'll find Miss Martha on the terrace," Rosa told her and curtseying, left.

Cora dawdled her way to the terrace, hoping to meet someone long enough to delay the visit still longer. But the house seemed deserted - Lady Anne had mentioned something about the men going shooting in the morning. And at last she found her way to the sunny terrace with its enchanting view of the grounds.

Cousin Alix and Lady Anne were gossiping like schoolgirls - which they had been together, at the same stylish London seminary - over tea and Mamma, under the guise of reading the papers, was plotting. She had the face of a hard-pressed general and at Cora's approach said sharply, "Cora! Whatever kept you for so long?"

Reproached as though she were still a child in the nursery and in front of company too, Cora flushed hotly. "I'm sorry to have kept you waiting, Mamma," she said and loath as she was, took a seat opposite her mother.

"How pretty your hair looks, dear," Lady Anne said, "Quaint but so becoming, don't you agree, Alix?" Cousin Alix was vocal with her approval and Mamma smiled a pained smile.

"I've invited the Crawleys to dinner tonight," Lady Anne said, with an utterly guileless look. "They're hosting their own party in a few days, so we won't see at our place as much of them as we'd like."

"Are you very close to the Crawleys, Lady Anne?" her mother asked sweetly.

"Oh we're always sociable and they are our neighbors," Lady Anne said. "Rosamund - that's the daughter - is really the thing and Robert - Viscount Downton, you know - is ever so agreeable."

"And the Countess, Lady Violet?"

"Lady _Grantham_ is what she is called," Cousin Alix murmured, looking slightly pained. "Her daughter is Lady Rosamund, since she is the daughter of an Earl, but Lady Grantham's father was a viscount."

"Oh you English," Mother said, unflappable. "You treat your rules like a national sport."

"Lady Grantham's a peppery sort," Lady Anne said, laughing. "She really says the sharpest things at times, but she's friendly enough to us. Lord Grantham can be _quite _delightful when he wants to be - apparently only the women used to be crazy about him thirty years ago."

"How old is Lady Rosamund?"

"Twenty-two."

"Why she's halfway to being an old maid," Mother said. "Is she a bluestocking?" She looked rather alarmed at the prospect - a malicious spinster (and spinsters without prospects were always malicious) with influence over her brother could cause no end of trouble to her campaign.

"Hardly," Lady Anne said. "Rosamund likes to enjoy herself - at other people's expense if it can be managed. But yes, I think she'll marry soon - and well. The estate's not as well as it might be."

Mother nodded, relieved. "And the Viscount?" she asked innocently. "Is he engaged in any way?"

"Not in the least," Cousin Alix began but Lady Anne looked thoughtful.

"There was talk-" she began and then hesitating added, "but it all came to nothing."

"Talk about what?" Cora asked.

Lady Anne looked at her as she would a canary that had thought to speak. Young girls simply did not intrude when their elders were discussing business - and marriage was a business transaction. "Oh about his courting one of the Cox girls," she said negligently. "But it all came to nothing of course and she married Rudolf Graeme in May."

"Varinia?" Cousin Alix scoffed. "They were childhood friends, I believe - isn't she a sort of distant cousin?"

"_Cousinage dangereux voisinage_," murmured Lady Anne, smiling faintly and insinuatingly. "Cousinhood is a dangerous neighborhood. She might have done better for herself, I dare say for Graeme is twice her age and he's already gone back to India. She'll follow in the winter when the weather is less inclement."

"I don't think she might have done better," Cousin Alix said maliciously. "She was getting on - twenty-five if she was a day - and with five sisters, not much of a dowry but Graeme had money of his own. I always thought her rather plain - Laetitia was the beauty of that family."

"Everyone says she's a sweet girl."

"Sweet, yes," Cousin Alix sniffed. "That is what a girl is called if she is insipid. She was as sweet as sugared water and just about as strong." She patted Cora's hand fondly, "Not like you, Cora, with your exquisite coloring and fine spirit."

Mother looked rather disturbed. "Does Lord Grantham fancy young ladies of her type?" she asked bluntly.

Cousin Alix gave her an untroubled smile. "He's a man, Cousin Martha," she said sweetly, "He prefers _everything_."

The talk turned to the members of Lady Grantham's next house-party. "A flock of eligible suitors for Rosamund," Cousin Alix giggled. "I can't imagine _which_ one the Countess fancies most for her daughter - but then I am not as intimately acquainted with the contents of their cheque-books. Lets see, she has invited Marmaduke Painswick, a _banker _of all things and Edward Bardsley, he comes from Thwaite stock at any rate-"

"Mr Bardsley?" Mother asked sharply. She glanced at Cora and then settled her features into smoother lines after Lady Anne looked at her in confusion. "Oh nothing - we have met on occasion in London."

"Yes," Cora murmured with a creamy smile. "Mamma and I both found him most delightful."

* * *

_Downton_

"I _must_ have a new dress." Looking like a sulky Madonna, Rosamund clambered gracelessly down the sweeping stairs into the front hall. "Especially in front of those tacky Americans who must have bought half of Maison Worth and will parade in front us tonight like dolled-up rhinoceroses."

"My dear, you don't need a new dress," Robert said gallantly. He offered his sister his arm and led her into the sitting room where they would wait until their parents presented themselves. "Your beauty will light up the room."

To his eyes, his sister was luminous. She looked like a Renaissance duchess in her square-necked gown of blue velvet, stately and timeless. Her hair was piled in golden ringlets, secured under a glittering band, high on her head, exposing the long lines of neck and throat. She had on Mamma's diamond choker with the brilliant teardrop pendants, a seventeenth-century heirloom that had recently come to fashion again after the Princess of Wales had adopted it. But she had no earrings or bracelets to set off the finery of her stones and the glittering band was only a broad ribbon that she'd sequined herself.

"_In robe and crown the king stept down, to meet and greet her on her way. It is no wonder, said the lords, she is more beautiful than day_," Rosamund quoted with an ironic smile. "I'm tired of being the Beggar Maid, Robert. You might not notice that this is my best gown, I've had it three years and its not at all in fashion - but Lady Anne will. And so will her ghastly Americans by tonight, she's never liked me for all she pretends to. I've always been more beautiful."

"You keep mentioning her Americans. Who are they?"

"Oh some cousins of Lady Fenn's that were invited to the house-party too - like trained monkeys to give a festive air, I suppose," Rosamund said negligently. "A Mrs Levinson and her daughter. Don't you go falling in love with her."

"I wouldn't dare," Robert said, "Although it seems the fashion to pay court to married ladies."

"In Paris!" Rosamund giggled. "I meant the daughter, silly. She's an heiress of some sort - I've never heard of an American girl who's come to England who's not - and of course she'll be wanting a husband. That seems to be their national occupation."

She buttoned her elbow-length gloves and descended once more into self-pity. "Oh I so hate being dowdy," she said plaintively.

"Well you know what to do about it," her mother said sharply. Lord and Lady Grantham entered the room arm-in-arm, not looking at each-other. Theirs was not a happy marriage and unless prompted by the need for severest economy, Father preferred to live in London with his dancer. Robert had heard that they had two girls, one still a child and the other in her teens.

"Papa," Rosamund said and kissed their Father on the cheek, smiling in the smugness of her small victory. Mother grimaced faintly.

"Sir," Robert and shook his Father's hand. He looked benign now, dapper, but there was no telling. He was a man of voluble moods and at least once during his interludes at home there would be scenes. Oh he would take himself in hand when they were in public but in private... he seemed to take delight in quarreling with Mother and though in the past, she had always backed down, at present she seemed to be as quick to flare up as he did when provoked. Robert could not blame her - Father had not been much of a husband to her.

Their marriage had been arranged by elderly relatives from both clans because it "looked right". Mother came from an old baronial family that could trace its roots to the Conquest and Father would be Earl of Grantham, a peerage created relatively recently when compared to her family's. Mother had been eighteen on her wedding day, she had submitted as meekly to what was expected of her as girls did in those days and then she had always had a strong sense of duty and propriety. Father, almost ten years older, had drifted negligently into marriage because that was the "done thing", not expecting it to intrude much into his bacchanalian lifestyle.

"Americans eh?" Father said amiably. "I've always liked American girls, for all that's been said of them - spirited and mettlesome like wild mustangs." He laughed.

"Like pets," Rosamund said sweetly. "But I was just telling Robert not to fall in love with them - what a _mesalliance_ that would be."

"I don't know about that," Father said, "I don't know that I would mind an American daughter-in-law." He smiled innocently at his son as though it were a joke but there was calculation, all the same, in his guileless blue eyes.

* * *

_Haxby Park  
_

Cora turned slowly on the spot, under her mother's critical eye. When her mother nodded and said that she'd do, she almost collapsed in weary exhaustion. She had been dressed and undressed and redressed for hours it seemed - nothing would please her mother enough. The first impression was all-important. She must be flawless when she was first presented to the viscount.

She wore a _mousseline de soie_ from Maison Worth, of palest pink and starred with pearls set in floral patterns. Her hair she had been permitted to style as pleased her, since it had met Lady Anne's approval - she wore a dainty little pearl coronet in it. She had on a three-tiered necklace of black pearls and matching earrings. There was the faintest touch of rogue on her pale cheeks and paint to warm her lips. She looked, as Cousin Alix agreed "so fresh and dainty and hardly American at all, you could be French".

She felt that she looked too young, but she supposed that was the impression they had wanted to go for. A young and biddable girl - that must gratify the stuffy English mother-in-law who might assume that she could take her in hand and tame her "Americanisms" in time. Well, let her try!

Cousin Alix herself looked far more sophisticated in her brilliant flame-colored silk with its peculiar clockwork design embroidered in black - a present from Mother from their trip to Paris. She clapped her hands in girlish pleasure and pronounced that Robert Crawley would not be able to resist.

"Shall we?" she prompted and Mother, pronouncing that they might as well, held out her hand imperiously for Cora. So she would be marched into the drawing room on her mother's arm like a little girl too. Really it was insufferable.

Their hostess, Lady Anne, was entertaining new arrivals but she smiled and beckoned them over as they entered. Cora caught sight of what seemed a family - a stuffy-looking woman in a high-necked black gown, a haughty blond girl in blue, a rather handsome, middle-aged gentleman and a young gentleman. He was good-looking in the English way - tall and fair, with cool, chiseled features.

"The Earl and Countess of Grantham, Viscount Downton and Lady Rosamund," Lady Anne introduced them. "Lady Fenn, you know of course. And these are their cousins from America, Mrs Levinson and Miss Cora Levinson."

Lady Grantham nodded indifferently and Lady Rosamund's smile was frosty and tinged with amusement. The young viscount made a small bow but Lord Grantham was effusive. "I have always admired American ladies," he said. He had such a friendly smile that Cora could not help joining in. "And clearly, not without cause. So spirited and beautiful of course, something about the fresh air there, eh? Miss Levinson do permit me to say that you look exquisite."

"Thank you," she said, blushing in pleasure. There was something so kind about him, he reminded her of a doting uncle. And he was really as handsome as Lady Anne had assured her.

Lady Anne attempted to restore the perfect social order that she had envisioned. "Robert, you will take Miss Levinson in to dinner? I know you two will get along splendidly - Miss Levinson is so well-read. Rosamund, here's Lord Napier to take you in..."

The girl looked hardly American at all, Robert could not help thinking as he took her into dinner, certainly not large and loud-voiced as all American girls were in his imagination. She was tall but there was something fragile and almost childlike about her - she looked hardly older than sixteen. Certainly she was striking with her rare coloring and elegant figure, but there was a subdued, pastel-like quality to that loveliness which subdued yet enhanced it. She had grave eyes and spoke little - which was just as well, the American accent not being to his taste at all. Hearing the mother's raucous tones was enough, that Miss Levinson should choose to comport herself with such pleasing dignity, so rare in a young girl, was commendable.

He spoke pleasantly and easily to her of books they had both read and pictures they had seen and admired. Not wishing to give her the wrong impression, he did not pay court to her beauty - he would have hated to have been classed as an eager fortune-hunting impoverished English lord. Instead he spoke to her as simply and naturally as he would to his sister and she responded in the same vein.

Lady Anne set a good table - the dinner was served _a la Russe _and the American girl, perhaps aware of her beady-eyed mother's scrutiny, ate little. Such figures did not come without a cost, Robert supposed and he gave her an ironic smile which she was quick to intercept. She smiled shyly at him in response, they did not need any words.

After dinner and drinks, when the men re-entered the parlor with the ladies, he was aware of a subtle pressure from his hostess. She would have liked to enclose him and the young lady in a tete-a-tete, he could see the dragoness mamma expecting it impatiently, but he refused to be drawn. Miss Levinson was urged to play and play she did like a well-trained parrot the well-rehearsed "drawing-room pieces". He complimented her, she thanked him coolly and both went their separate ways. He was aware of Anne's irritation but it could not be helped.

As Rosamund remarked, on the drive back home, Anne's career as matchmaker was not destined to take off.

Cora's mother paced her bedroom restlessly, demanding if her daughter had related _all_ the details of their dinner conversation to her, had she forgotten anything? A passing look, a subtle shift in attitude, something, anything?

"I've already told you three times, Mamma," Cora said patiently, while Rosa brushed her hair. "He was very polite, warmer than that dreadful sister and mother certainly, but that was all." She smiled smugly - she liked the viscount's easy attitude and the way he had made no attempt to make love to her. Clearly he had more dignity than she had expected of him. He had not acted superior, as many of the boys who courted her liked to - he had not tried to overawe her with "manly wisdom" nor shoot down her opinions. He was actually a very pleasant young man - perhaps he had that from his father? The Earl was so charming. His sister was like their mother at any rate - snide and superior.

Her mother scowled at her as though it were all her fault that the viscount had not nibbled at her like fish a bait. "What ails him?" she asked crossly. "He's in dire straits, I've heard-"

"I suppose its the English pride," Cora yawned, wriggling her toes in her soft slippers. They were heaven after the tight high heels that had cramped her feet all evening long. Rosa began to plait her hair.

"It had better be the English pride, miss," her mother said sharply. "And not the American stubbornness." A new idea seized her. "Maybe he doesn't wish to appear too eager, beneath his dignity. But he'll come around."

"I wouldn't be too sure of that. They might be a shabby family after all - did you see his sister's old velvet? Parading around in that dowdy thing with those hideous diamonds in their dingy settings. I could have laughed!" _I should have, _Cora thought. _That would hav__e put her in her place. _But she had never put anyone in their place and would not have begun to know how. She had been raised to be docile and expect for small flashes of rebellion against her mother - which she seldom put to words - was called "a very sweet-tempered girl".

_Perhaps I am only sweet because I am so insipid as to have no other personality, _she thought with a pang, remembering Cousin Alix's words of the morning. _Perhaps they are all laughing at me - the little American sheep who'll marry as she's bidden and obey her husband as she does her mother afterwards. I wouldn't know where to start growing a personality - I've never been taught how to. _

"Well tomorrow is a fresh day," her mother said practically. "And I mean to see to it that we see a great deal of the Crawleys. I liked the young man and I shall soon see Downton for myself - apparently its even grander than Haxby."

"Just as you say, Mamma," Cora murmured and slipped into bed.

* * *

**A/N: I've edited the last chapter and added more to it. Please check it out.  
**


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